Memories Of The Past
by Casey Crystal
Summary: A Marlene fiction that explains why you should respect your elders....


*****Inspired by a little book I had to read in Eng class against my own will (because the teacher is evil and she scares me and I was afraid she'd hurt me severely if I didn't read it then fail me and have me expelled and forever ruin my life by dying and haunting me until I myself died insane and she'd follow me around for eternity after that....), "To Kill A Mockingbird."*****  
  
  
  
  
  
******~****Memories Of The Past****~******  
  
  
  
  
Kalm had grown to become such a quiet town many years after the fall of ShinRa. Today was no exception. Some birds softly sang in the morning as two children ran along the sidewalk laughing. The older of the two was Kodama, a young boy with short spikey black hair, and curious red eyes with the slightest hint of a glow in them. His younger sister, Saeta, was a little girl with long blonde hair and blue eyes on her face.  
  
"Shh, Saeta," whispered Kodama and they slowed to a walk. They were passing the house of Miss Marlene, an old woman who spent her days sitting on a chair on the porch covered in a shawl. No one really knew her but the towm rumored that she was a little over the edge.  
  
"Kodama, Saeta!" the older woman called suddenly. "Why don't you two come up here and give an old lady some company." The children exchanged nervous looks but went through the open gate and sat on the porch steps.  
  
"Good afternoon, Miss Marlene! How are you today?" said Saeta cheerfully. Miss Marlene smiled.  
  
"I'm doing just fine, child, thank you." She paused suddenly, and smiled as she looked at the two children.  
  
"What?" asked Kodama nervously.  
  
"Say 'Pardon'," Kodama, it's more polite. I was just thinking about how much you two look like your ancestors. Have your parents ever told you who your looks come from?" The two shook their heads. "Well, I'm shocked. I'm sure you two know all about the famous rebel group, AVALANCHE?"  
  
"Yes, ma'am," said Kodama. "We've had to learn all about that in socials class, about how they saved the world from some dude named Sephiroth who was the ex-leader of that group."  
  
Miss Marlene shook her head. "Tsk, tsk. Those schools never do give you the right information. Do you know that Cloud Strife and Tifa Lockheart are your grandparents, and Yuffie Kisaragi is also your ancestor?"  
  
"Seriously? How?" asked Saeta. Kodama looked at her, she was more interested than he was.  
  
"Tifa and Cloud had gotten married with several children, and one of their sons married Yuffie's sole child, and those two had your father. I'm surprised your parents have never told you."  
  
"How do you know this?" asked Kodama, his know-it-all attitude taking over. He placed his hands on his hips.  
  
But Miss Marlene only smiled. "I ought to know, for I'm Barret's adopted daughter. I've watched your family grow." The children's eyes widened.  
  
"But you're not that old."  
  
The older woman chuckled. "I'll take that as a compliment, but I am quite old."  
  
"What was it like, living through the dark ages?" asked Saeta, her eyes aglow with excitement.  
  
"I was very shy and withdrawn, and I often felt like I was in the way. My father couldn't go anywhere or do anything without having to make sure I was safe. The slums were not a very safe place to be. But after a while, he met Tifa Lockheart, and they became friends. I remember Tifa," said Marlene fondly "She was a wonderful cook and took care of me just like my mother had. But all that changed the day Cloud had wandered into her bar."  
  
"What were the others like?" asked Saeta. Miss Marlene smiled warmly at the memories.  
  
"I hadn't really known all of them during their journey, but I had met a few. Aeris Gainsborough, or as I had called her 'Flower Lady,' was truely an angel. She gave up her freedom for mine when both our lives were in danger. I had never known until much later that she had died at the hands of Sephiroth." She frowned. "Sephiroth wasn't a happy fellow. He had been born only to become an experiment, but he had later discovered this and that information drove him insane."  
  
"Yeah, I heard he went coocoo." Kodama crossed his eyes and rolled his head around with his tongue hanging out for the effect.  
  
"Shush, Kodama!" said Saeta. "I want to hear this. So did they stop Sephiroth? Was it a happy ending?"  
  
"We're here, aren't we?" smiled Miss Marlene. "Ah, it was a miracle, a pure miracle. Sephiroth had called upon Meteor to hit our lovely little Planet. Just before it hit, your ancestors had killed Sephiroth finally, but the rock-of-fire was still coming. Holy arose to stop the destruction, but it wouldn't work."  
  
"Oh no! What happened?"  
  
"From deep within the Lifestream, the Flower Lady had prayed her little heart out, and the Lifestream itself had begun to pull itself from the Planet, and it flowed in tiny streams to where Meteor was slowly attempting to crush Midgar. I had been watching the entire thing from my bedroom window. It was a miracle. The Lifestream had stopped Meteor victoriously. Sephiroth had been destroyed, the same with his Meteor, and ShinRa had fallen."  
  
"What happened to Cloud and the others???"  
  
Marlene began rocking slightly in her chair. "Well, it had taken the boy at least two years to tell Tifa that he had feelings for her, and the marriage was soon held. They had made me the Flower Girl, and I had worn a little pink dress with a red top just because of the similarity in my title to Aeris'. They had two children, a boy and a girl, the boy being your grandfather. Yuffie Kisaragi, ex-materia theif, had somehow grown afectionate towards that red-haired spunky kid from the Turks, and their sole daughter had ran away from home at a tender age after fighting with her mother. I swear that girl had her mother's stubborness. Well, she married Cloud and Tifa's son, and those two had your father, as I had explained before."  
  
Saeta was speechless, as she thought about all of this. Kodama, on the other side, wasn't convinced. "Then how come you ain't dead yet? You gotta be pretty old to have seen all of that!"  
  
"One-hundred and twenty-seven, to be exact, my boy." Miss Marlene replied, ignoring the rude comment. A sudden wind made her shiver and she pulled her blankets around her tighter. "It's getting mighty cold out here, children. You'd best get inside. Tell your father that I said 'hello'."  
  
Kodama and Saeta nodded before jumping off the porch and running all the way home, both obviously glad to be away from her. Miss Marlene rolled her wheelchair inside and came into the living room in front of the fire. Slowly, her eyes drifted upwards to the piture sitting atop the mantle. It was all of the AVALANCHE group, and a few others. Tifa was sitting on Cloud's lap in a chair, surrounded by many of the AVALANCHE members. Off to the left, Yuffie stood smiling with Reno who had his arms around her. Elena stood smiling as well, and Rude was watching Tifa, slight jealous towards Cloud.  
  
Marlene herself was sitting on the floor in front of them all, holding the Holy materia tightly and beaming broadly. She was a bit older than before Cloud had even showed up at Tifa's bar, but she was still a young girl.  
  
The wind outside picked up a little.  
@-^--  
"Daddy, how come you never told us that Cloud Strife was our anscestor."  
  
Their father, Mr. Strife (though they had the same last name, he had always claimed it was a coincidence), looked at them from behind his paper at Saeta. "Who have you been talking to?"  
  
"Miss Marlene, father. We had talked to her earlier this morning. She says hi."  
  
He smiled. "I always knew she'd tell you one day, and I felt that she'd tell it better, as she was there too witness most of if. Did you enjoy hearing about your heritage?"  
  
Saeta nodded, but Kodama didn't. "Nah, I didn't believe her. After all, she's just....well, she's old."  
  
His eyes raised slightly. "True, she's quite aged, but I grew up knowing her all of my life, and I know that that woman would never tell a lie. Everything that she's told you is absolutely true."  
  
Saeta's eyes widened. "Did you meet Cloud and the others?"  
  
He nodded. "Well, as Cloud, Tifa, Yuffie and Reno were my grandparents, I should've, though all but Tifa had died by the time I was born. Ah, she was a sweet woman. so full of life, and she chatted constantly about her late husband, so it was like he was always there. It was so sad that she passed away, and by then all I had left who had been on that journey was Miss Marlene." His eyes flickered with the memory of childhood, before fading away.  
  
The two were silent, and their father looked at him, looking as if he wanted to say something. "I-I had just received a call, just a few minutes ago, regarding Miss Marlene..."  
  
"Golly, father," said Kodama, "What is it?"  
  
He gulped. "Miss Marlene had passed away, shortly after you two had left. Strange, though. She had asked for me to have this..." He went over to a small box, and carefully pulled out a small picture frame, the one that she had been looking at earlier.   
  
He rubbed some invisible dust off it with his thumb, then looked at his children. "I think she would have wanted you two to have it.....it's only right that you know what your anscestors looked like."  
  
Kodama and Saeta slowly accepted the picture, and exchanged a sad look before peering into the picture. Everyone seemed so bright and happy, smiling. All eyes found their way down to a little girl sitting on the carpet in front of the rest, a happy young brunette with a wide beam across her face, satisfied.  
  
  
Kodama smiled, maybe she wasn't the crazy old coot he had pegged her as.  
  
  
  
  
  
'~-the end-~'  
  
  
  
A/N: I'm not quite sure what motivated me to write this, but I'm sure that freaky little book had something to do with it. I hoped you enjoy it and please remember that some elderly ppl ARE old coots (my eng eacher for ex.), but most are pretty cool. thanks and I would really enjoy some reviews, otherwise you're going to fall into the old coot catagorie! *grins*  
  
If you're wondering where the heck I came up with Kodama and Saeta, they're normal japanese words I had found a while ago:  
Kodama = echo  
Saeta = clear, bright  
I named Saeta that because I wanted her to have that kind of personality, and I don't remember why I named Kodama after an ECHO but it'll come to me..in about a year from now =) 


End file.
